Coalition calls for consultation over plan to close Angus seed plant

Nursery owner says more time needed to come up with transition plan

by Brad Pritchard Alliston Herald

The provincial government is receiving major blowback from businesses, industry experts and environmental groups over its plan to close the Angus seed plant next fall.

The province has announced it will be shutting down the 94-year-old plant next September in order to move toward a “more efficient and modern native seed genetic archive.”

The closure could have a major impact on businesses and tree-planting operations across Ontario, including Somerville Nurseries in Everett.

The plant has supplied the nursery seeds since it was founded in 1950, and the nursery remains one of the plant’s biggest customers, with about 10 million seeds purchased annually.

The plant is also the No. 1 supplier to the 50 Million Tree Program operated by the nonprofit charity Forests Ontario.

Nursery owner Fred Somerville believes the writing has been on a while for some time now, noting how the decision by the Harris government to close all of the provincial nurseries in the mid 1990s left it severely underutilized.

What he doesn’t get is why the closure has to happen so quickly.

“It’s irresponsible and unreasonable, and if they just decide to shut the thing down, we’re not sure where we are going to get the seeds from,” he said, noting businesses and groups will be forced to by seeds from plants in Manitoba or Quebec.

Since the closure was announced in August, an ad hoc committee called the Ontario Tree Seed Coalition was formed to convince the province to rethink the decision.

Somerville, who is part of the coalition, said the group is asking the province to put its plans on hold until a proper consultation process takes place.